Sikha Sarma A 48-YEAR-OLD woman was arrested in Guwahati on Tuesday on charges of sedition and other offences for an alleged Facebook post on security forces after 22 personnel were killed in a Maoist attack in Chattisgarh.
The accused, Sikha Sarma, a Guwahati-based writer, was arrested under “various sections, including IPC 124A (sedition)”, Guwahati Police Commissioner Munna Prasad Gupta said. “She will be produced in court tomorrow.”
Sarma, known to be vocal on social media, had allegedly written a Facebook post on Monday: “Salaried professionals who die in the line of duty cannot be termed martyrs. Going by that logic, electricity department workers who die of electrocution should also be labelled martyrs. Do not make people sentiment, media.”
The post received a lot of backlash online. On Monday, Gauhati High Court advocates Umi Deka Baruah and Kangkana Goswami filed an FIR. “The case was registered and the arrest made on the basis of the FIR,” Dispur police station Prafulla Kumar Das said.
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